mindless ramblings

We woke up late on the second day, around 11am or so. With only 5 hours of sunlight left, we were somewhat restricted in the amount of sightseeing we could do. At least we were feeling much more energetic than the day before!

Our first stop of the day was the Royal BC Musuem. Besides permanent exhibits such as the First Nations gallery, Natural History gallery and Modern History gallery, the museum also plays host to travelling exhibits. We were lucky enough to have the oppotunity to enjoy a collection of photographs taken by Linda McCartney back in the 60s. There were intimate portraits of such legends such as the Beatles, Rolling Stones and Jimi Hendrix, together with a collection of psychedelic memorabilia from the era like album covers and the like. There even was John Lennon’s “flower power” Rolls-Royce right next to the entrance!

What a paint job!

The Natural History gallery was full of dioramas depicting the typical flora and fauna of Britsh Columbia. BC is truly home to a diverse variety of landscapes, from coastal rainforest to alpine conditions.

Look at that HUGE walrus!

Our next stop was the Modern History gallery. This contains dioramas and a full scale mockup of early colonial British Columbia. There were sections devoted to mining, fishing, lumber and other traditionally important industries. They even managed to create a working waterwheel into the floor space, very impressive!

Peering into a Chinese medicinal shop.

I have no idea what that means.

The final part of the visit was to the First Nations exhibits. Photography is not allowed in this whole section, so you’ll have to go there to see the stuff yourself! Amongst all the various ancient artifacts were a full size mockup of a pit house, and a tribal chief’s home (or something like that).

The visit was definitely worth the money (~$8 for student admission), and I would highly recommend it to anyone going to Victoria. With that out of the way, we were starving and set off in search of lunch. We ended up at a place called Garlic Rose which served a wide selection of steak and seafood dishes. I ended up with a steak and lobster combo for only $19.95, Esther had fish and chips and our double-dating counterparts (Becki and Ketchup!) had pretty much the same thing, except without lobster. The food was delicious, you can’t go wrong with melt-in-your-mouth lobster tail and well seasoned sirloin. The food was so good I forgot to take pictures before I devoured the meal!

With our first stop and lunch out of the way, we headed back to the hotel to rest up and get ready to drive to Butchart Gardens to check out the christmas lightup. Butchart Gardens is probably Victoria’s most well known landmark, pretty much any tour of Victoria will include a drive up Hwy 17 for gawking tourists to snap pictures in front of blooming flowers. The christmas lightup was not too shabby, although $18/person for admission is kind of steep, especially in winter with no blooming flowers and not much else to do.

What a cute smile eh!

Posing in front of the christmas tree, no presents though…

A vain attempt to capture the lightup

By the time we got back to the hotel, it was getting late and our original dinner plan was thrown into disarray when we drove by and saw they were closed already (more on this later). We ended up just eating in the bar/lounge downstairs. Food was average, but it was made better by watching the Canucks win at the same time on a big screen (not really) TV.

Another game of Cranium brought an end to the day’s activities… tomorrow is the final day, check back to see what we did!